seeing not very good here - maybe 1.5/5..but I wanted to move on from open clusters - carina i thought was as good as any to start.I tried shading with pastel - but on the dark card i have it was not so successful - i would appreciate any tips for blending it. the top star is not so bright - but i tried to make it white/yel

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Daniel, great work with white pastel on dark stock! Working this way is a pretty big shift from graphite on white paper. A couple things to try:1) Try working large--I'm finding that a circle about 13 cm in diameter gives good scale for stars and enough space to work on blending with nebulous objects2) If the textured paper is not behaving well for small, detailed nebulae, try a smooth stock3) After lightly applying pastel to define the nebula, use a blending stump to smooth and sculpt it. Blending stumps can remove the pastel as much as they blend it though--and this can be both irritating and useful. It takes some getting used to. This also means you'll need to apply or re-apply stars within the nebula since they'll get obliterated in the process.

I don't know if that gets to any of the concerns you faced...let us know.

In any case, that's a wonderful sketch of the Carina Nebula. I'm looking forward to seeing more!

An excellent observation of the Carina Nebula. It is a treat for us "Northerners" to study deep sky objects of the southern hemisphere. Jeremy's advice is very good. We all look forward to your future observations.